The reason for Giratina’s potential resurgence
Going into EUIC, there is room for Giratina to be viable again. Rotation and a new set release will lead to competitors playing all sorts of different archetypes and novel lists. Giratina has strength in this type of meta because of the well-rounded nature of the deck. Star Requiem takes a knock out on any ex, V, VStar or VMax. The only popular way to stop Star Requiem has been Big Parasol, and it is going to rotate out of the format. Dishing out 280 is very strong against any archetype which plays multi-prize Pokémon. However, against one-prize decks, you can simply play Tina as a one-prize Lost Box deck, making use of attackers like Cramorant, Sableye, Radiant Greninja and Snorlax. In short, Giratina gives you a good shot against any wacky (or meta) deck you may run into. It has no bad matchups and no amazing matchups; it is a deck where you try to win by outplaying your opponent.
I am predicting a high number of decks in the category of “other,” however there are four archetypes that I predict will be most popular. In order of popularity, I believe they will be: Lugia, Lost Box, Mew, and Gardevoir. The top three are the same as they have been, but the numbers will likely be a bit more flattened. Instead of seeing 30% Lugia, 20% Lost Box, and 15% Mew, I believe we will see closer to 20% of each deck. This is what tends to happen when a rotation happens, because there is not a decided-upon best deck yet. Remember that Lugia loses essentially all of its powerful attackers and almost all of its special Energy to the rotation.
Gardevoir should be the 4th most popular deck because it is the new shiny archetype that everyone is interested in, but it will not be more popular than the other listed decks because many people will not want to drop the money to buy the cards needed, or simply will not play it because they are not yet comfortable bringing it to a big event. Again, what this means is that you should not play a meta-call deck for EUIC. You should instead play something that can have a shot against anything, and the best deck to do that could be Giratina.
Techs for different decks
We will need some techs to deal with the developing meta, so let’s start with that. Star Requiem is awesome, but it can only be used once. 280 is not quite the number to hit against decks like Lugia and Mew. Lugia now plays multiple copies of V-Guard, and Mew has 310 HP. What’s the best way to deal with both of those? Choice Belt. Belt will not always be enough against Mew because Oricorio still stops the KO, but Sableye can clean up the math. Alternatively, you can play Temple of Sinnoh, which shuts off V-Guard and forces Mew to find a counter Stadium. Sinnoh is also a Path counter, meaning it can activate Drapion V, if you chose to play it in your list. I’ll go over this later in the article, but we will need to have Sinnoh, Belt, or both, to help with these matchups.
Next is Lost Box. Sableye is the best attacker to use in a Lost Box mirror, which makes Pokémon recovery crucial. The options for making this happen post-rotation are Miriam and Klara. One or two copies of either of these cards will likely be needed to help with general consistency and the Lost Box matchup. Switch Cart is also a great way to improve your matchup because it can heal off residual damage on Comfey or Manaphy from your opponent’s Lost Mine. We may not want to play too many Switch Cart over regular Switch simply because Cart cannot move Giratina VStar, but some sort of split is likely optimal. Snorlax is also a solid attacker against other Lost Box decks, and Hawlucha can allow for two knockouts in one turn if combined with Lost Mine. This was the case in the past, with Zigzagoon, however a Net had to be used to get two pings off, whereas Hawlucha has two pings built in.
Gardevoir may not need to be teched for, but if we are to tech for it, then Path is likely the best option. The reason for this is that if you knock out your opponent’s attacker and shut down Gardevoir ex’s Ability, your opponent will whiff an attack unless they bump Path. You can take this further by playing Roxanne in the same turn. However, keep in mind that Beach Court is a very strong Stadium in any Lost Box deck. When we start talking about teching in different Stadiums to help with different matchups, remember that it will be at the expense of not taking advantage of the best consistency Stadium that any Lost Zone deck can play. I would argue that you can afford to play Sinnoh or Path, but you likely cannot fit in both, because Beach Court is far too important (especially early game). I think the best tech for Gardevoir is actually just speed and consistency. If you can start using Sableye quickly, you can pick off Ralts and Kirlia consistently and force the Gardevoir player into not being able to set up enough Gardevoir. In other words, the best tech for Gardevoir may simply be more switching effects. You could also play Pokegear (to find Colress) or Lost Vacuum, both to get cards in the Lost Zone more quickly.
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